At least 14 people were killed and over 78 others were injured in the US airstrikes in Iran, which continued for the second day, Iran’s health ministry said in a statement on Thursday, July 9.
The US has hit more than 160 targets inside Iran since its Central Command launched the fresh strikes in the early morning of Wednesday, which were mostly focused on the southern and coastal areas.
US President Donald Trump declared on Wednesday that the ceasefire and memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed with Iran last month was over and that US forces would continue to attack and may even try to take control of Kharg Island.
Trump also declared that the US may reimpose the naval blockade on Iran which was lifted last month after the MoU was signed. He was speaking during a press conference after attending the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkey.
However, he later denied that there is any plan to restart the war against Iran.
The US strikes have hit various civilian and military locations in cities such as Bandar Abbas, Iranshahr, Konarak, Chabahar, and Bushehr, among others.
Iran claimed the attacks caused substantial damage to civilian infrastructure, apart from causing casualties. In an official statement, it called the US strikes a “war crime” and vowed an adequate response.
The latest hostility began after CENTCOM launched a “series of powerful strikes” inside Iran to “impose heavy costs for targeting and attacking commercial shipping” in “international waterway” in the early morning of Wednesday.
Hours after it announced the completion of the strikes claiming to have targeted over 80 Iranian locations during the attacks, fresh strikes were launched on Thursday. CENTCOM claimed to have hit another 90 targets inside Iran this time.
CENTCOM tried to justify the strikes by alleging Iran was responsible for the attacks on three commercial vessels that were transiting the Strait of Hormuz through an alternative route earlier this week.
Tehran has dismissed the US justification for the attacks as “false pretext.” It had earlier denied any responsibility for the attack on the ships however, repeating the warnings against any attempts to use routes other than those designated by it.
Iranian retaliation
In response to US airstrikes, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) launched several attacks on US military bases in Bahrain and Kuwait on both Wednesday and Thursday.
According to the IRGC, its missiles and drones hit over 85 different targets in and around Port Salman, the base of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet in Bahrain, and Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait, on Wednesday.
Similar strikes were carried out on Thursday as well with the IRGC claiming more retaliatory attacks will be launched on US assets in the region soon.
On Wednesday, IRGC had claimed to have downed a US MQ-9 drone over Iran’s southern province of Bushehr.
Iran will not allow any external role in Strait of Hormuz
On Wednesday, Iran accused the US of committing a major violation of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed last month between the two countries, which officially ended the US-Israeli war launched on February 28.
Iran has insisted that as per point five of the MoU, it has the sole right to devise a plan to manage the strait, in consultation with other states in the Persian Gulf. US attempts to open a new route in the strait violate that provision.
Despite Iranian warnings, the US has been trying to open an alternative route within the strait. Several ships, including the three earlier this week, have come under attack while trying to use that US-sponsored alternative route.
The US attacks on the last two days seem to be targeted at undermining Iran’s ability to control the strait.
However, Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters repeated the Iranian warnings against US attempts to “meddle in the waterway affairs” claiming such attempts will, “under no circumstances,” go unpunished.
“It is reiterated that the only safe passage for commercial vessels and oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz is the route designated by the Islamic Republic,” it claimed.
Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf, speaker of the Iranian parliament and head of its official negotiating team, reiterated on Thursday that the “Strait of Hormuz will only be reopened under ‘Iranian arrangements’ not through American threats.”
On Wednesday, he had listed several US violations of the MoU on his page on X. His list followed a declaration announcing that the “era of bullying and extortion is over. It leads nowhere. We don’t fold.”
Apart from violations around the strait, Ghalibaf’s list includes the new sanctions on Iranian oil and a fresh Israeli offensive in Lebanon.
Ghalibaf was referring to reports of the Trump administration revoking a license to sell Iranian oil days after agreeing to lift all sanctions.
Coinciding with the US attacks on Iran, Israel also carried out fresh attacks inside southern Lebanon on Wednesday morning.
An attempt to overshadow Khamenei’s funeral
The IRGC argued that the fresh attacks launched on Wednesday were an attempt by the US to overshadow the massive funeral processions in Iran and Iraq for former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and some of his family members, who were assassinated by the US and Israel on the very first day of their war on Iran.
Millions of people have been participating in the funeral processions carried out in various cities in Iran and Iraq between July 3 and July 9. The massive outpouring of public grief over Khamenei’s killing has raised questions about the Trump administration’s claims about him being unpopular and even hated among common Iranians.
“Following the epic created by the great Iranian nation in the unprecedented, magnificent, and enemy shattering funeral procession for the unique figure of the era and the martyr leader of the Islamic nation,” the US “which regarded the global reflection of the massive, million strong uprising of the proud Iranian nation in the historic farewell to the martyred mujahid as an even greater defeat” carried out new attacks in “panic” and desperation, the IRGC statement said.
Zoe. , July 9, 2026
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